


there is someone I have to protect

by felinedetached



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types
Genre: F/F, she is CAPABLE and wants to HELP god damnit, winry is a badass and won't let ed and al go to central without her
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-17
Updated: 2018-03-17
Packaged: 2019-03-24 11:34:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13810338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/felinedetached/pseuds/felinedetached
Summary: When Riza Hawkeye tells Winry Rockbell that she joined the army to protect someone, Winry relates. So, when Edward Elric leaves to join the army, and Alphonse promises to follow him, well. Winry might want to follow them both. Did anyone think about that?





	there is someone I have to protect

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ShanaStoryteller](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShanaStoryteller/gifts).



> This was largely inspired by two of [@shanastoryteller](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShanaStoryteller/pseuds/ShanaStoryteller)'s tumblr posts: [This one](http://shanastoryteller.tumblr.com/post/170899816505/happy-valentines-if-its-not-too-late-fullmetal), and [this one](http://shanastoryteller.tumblr.com/post/170738034940/happy-valentines-day-fullmetal-alchemist).

It starts with Den, barking at the door. That’s not something too strange - he barks all the time. But Den’s barking is followed by your grandmother’s voice, calling to Den and then to strangers, as the door-hinges creak in protest and said stranger demands to see Ed and Al.

 

(This is the beginning of the end, but you do not know that yet.)

 

Voices yell, Granny quietly asks you to make tea for the guests, and you do, hearing Al’s voice fade in the background as he quietly, quietly repeats the same two words.

 

_ “We’re sorry, we’re sorry,” _

 

* * *

 

There is a blonde woman - a soldier, sitting on a bench in the hall. You’ve been told to make them tea, so you offer her one. Honestly, you’re curious. What could drive  _ anyone _ to become a soldier? To kill innocents, people like your parents, in cold blood?

 

“Here you are,” you say, voice soft, holding out the tea. The woman looks up at you, smiles. Her smile is warm.

 

“Thanks,” she says, taking the offered teacup. You sit next to her once she takes it, look down into the swirling brown liquid in the cup on the tray in your lap. You can feel her eyes on you.

 

“Um, Lieutenant,” you start, and you’re not entirely sure what it is you wish to ask, but there’s something.

 

“You can call me Riza,” she interrupts, “Riza Hawkeye. Nice to meet you.” She holds out a hand, smiles again, and you don’t know how her smile can be that warm when she’s  _ killed people. _

 

She’s a soldier. She has to have killed people.

 

Right?

 

“Miss Riza,” you ask, careful, “have you ever shot anyone?” She gasps beside you, just the tiniest noise, and you know you’ve surprised her.

 

“Yes,” she says, and her voice is soft but firm.

 

“I hate soldiers,” you tell her, and don’t wait for her response. “My mother and father were taken away to the battlefield, and they were killed there. And now, you’re trying to take Ed and Al away too.”

 

You’re expecting a fight, an argument, anything. You’re expecting her to say sorry, or that your parents died in the line of duty and that you should be proud of them. You don’t get any of that.

 

“It’s up to them to decide whether or not they will go,” she says, and stares at door set in the opposite wall. “Yes, they will decide for themselves. Whether to move forward, or whether to stay still.”

 

_ They’ll get themselves killed _ , you think. You’ve witnessed what they do when they move forward - they come back bloody and broken, missing arms and legs and bodies.

 

“The boys will be the ones to decide,” she continues, and you almost get the feeling she’s not talking to you anymore.

 

“Miss Riza,” you ask, because this curiosity is killing you. She’s shot people, but she doesn’t seem like the kind of person who would. You’d never think someone like her would be a soldier. “Why did you become a soldier?”

 

“Because there is someone I have to protect.”

 

You want to ask more, you desperately want to  _ know  _ more, but the door swings open. The stern-faced Colonel walks out, and Riza rises instantly, putting down her tea and picking up her jacket in one smooth motion.

 

“We’re leaving,” he says.

 

“Yes, sir,” she replies, and she  _ can’t _ leave, you still have so much more to ask!

 

But they do. They walk out the door together.

 

“Well, goodbye, young lady,” Riza tells you, as you wave them off. You offer her your hand, looking down.

 

“It’s Winry,” you tell her, because this person - this  _ soldier _ \- seems like someone you’d like to know more of. You think, perhaps, that you’d like to be like her someday. Fighting for those you want to protect. For Ed, and for Al.

 

“Okay, Winry,” Riza Hawkeye says, “I hope we’ll meet again,” and she shakes your hand and you watch her cart drive off over the hills, and you hope so too.

 

* * *

 

“Are you sure you won’t regret this?” Granny asks, but from the look on Ed’s face you already know the answer.

 

“Mhm. I’ve already made up my mind. How long will the surgery and rehabilitation take?”

 

“About three years,” Granny says, and she’s being  _ generous _ . For someone like Ed, with his determination, it might only take three years.

 

But that’s pushing it.

 

“One year,” Ed says.

 

You’d dreaded this.

 

“You’re gonna be spitting blood,” Granny says, and Ed just nods. He’s going to do this.

 

You’re going to watch him kill himself to do this. 

 

* * *

 

When you and Granny start attaching his nerves to the receptors, he starts screaming. You hate it.

 

* * *

 

The crackling sound characteristic of alchemy comes from outside, and you rush onto the porch, sighing when you realise it’s just Ed. Then you notice what he’s transmuted. You don’t really pay much attention to what they’re talking about, and before you know it, there’s a wrench flying from your hand at Ed.

 

“Hey!” you cry, “You’ve deformed my automail!” Doesn’t he realise how delicate and complicated automail components are? If he’s damaged it, you’ll murder him.

 

“Does that make it okay for you to deform my head?” He asks, and he’s practically growling at you. “Good grief, you’re one uncharming gearhead.”

 

That hurts, even if you don’t want to admit it. But that’s okay. 

 

“I’m okay with being uncharming. I’m okay with being a gearhead. I’ve made up my mind to support you until you get your body back!”

 

“Huh?” Ed says, and he sounds so disbelieving that you hit him with another wrench.

 

* * *

 

“I wonder if brother is doing alright on his exam,” Al says, and his voice is wistful, and slightly hollow, echoing through the armour. You don’t like that echo. It reminds you of what they’ve lost.

 

“Hey, Al,” you say, softly.

 

“Hmm? What?” Al asks.

 

“If Ed becomes a State Alchemist, are you leaving the village?”

 

Al makes an affirmative noise in the back of his throat (which, you are amazingly curious about that - how can he speak with no vocal cords?) and in silence you stare out over the countryside together. It’s sad, almost.

 

You don’t think you like these silences either.

 

* * *

 

A letter arrives for Al, and it’s from the Fullmetal Alchemist. Al cheers, and you smile, but you know now what you’re going to do.

 

_ “Miss Riza, why did you become a soldier?” _

 

_ “Because there is someone I have to protect.” _

 

* * *

 

“Granny, I’m thinking of joining the military.”

 

* * *

 

She curses at you, which is to be expected. She calls you stupid, tells you that you’ll regret it if you join.

 

She sighs, eventually, says, “You have that same look in your eyes that Ed did when he said he’d finish a three-year rehabilitation in a year.”

 

“I do?”

 

“I’ll support you in this, Winry, if only because there’s no stopping you.”

 

“Thank you,” you say, voice soft, and you really mean it.

 

(It is here that you change the course of fate, although you will never truly know that.)

 

* * *

 

You go to central, sometime when Ed and Al aren’t there - off on some mission to a far-off land, and you walk into the military offices and tell them you’re here to enlist. They laugh, as you’d expected, because you are a thirteen-year-old girl who doesn’t look like she’d ever be a soldier, but then you pull an automail arm from your bag.

 

“I made this,” you say, placing it on the desk, “and I am here to enlist.”

 

They stop laughing.

 

* * *

 

“Congratulations, Dr Winry Rockbell. You’ve been accepted.”

 

* * *

 

“I’m proud,” Granny’s voice says, crackly over the phone, “I always knew you could do it.”

 

“You never wanted me to do it.”

 

“No, but I knew that if  _ you  _ wanted to do it, you’d get in,” she sighs, and it comes out more like static, “You’re your parent’s daughter, after all.”

 

“No,” you say, and ignore her confused ‘what’ as you finish, “I am my grandmother’s granddaughter.”

 

She laughs at that, loud and more delighted than you’ve ever heard her.

 

“That you are.”

 

* * *

 

You’re assigned to central (fortuitously, under Roy Mustang for field missions, and under Dr Walter the rest of the time, although he says “there’s nothing more I can teach this girl” and you laughed at that, because there is always more to learn and this man is  _ clueless _ ) and are, as such, in Colonel Mustang’s office when Ed returns.

 

“Wha - Winry?” he yells, and you turn, in full uniform, to salute him.

 

“Major Elric,” you respond, and want to laugh at his expression. Mustang  _ does _ laugh, tilting his head back and dismissing you with a wave of his hand.

 

“That was a most enlightening conversation, Dr Rockbell,” he says, “you’re dismissed.” You bow, shoot a smirk at Ed, and go to find Riza.

 

(Ed and Mustang argue over this - Ed blaming Mustang for making you a part of this, and Mustang rebutting with the fact that you made  _ yourself _ one. Ed doesn’t believe him. You’ll tell him, much later, that it was his own tendency for self-destruction that made you enlist.)

 

* * *

 

When Ed finally leaves the Colonel’s office, he finds you perched on Riza’s desk, talking to her as she works. 

 

“Winry!” He yells, and you glance up, throw a smile, and look back to Riza. She just laughs quietly. 

 

“Go on, you’re distracting me from my paperwork.”

 

“And here I thought you were better at multitasking,” you tease, before calling back to Ed. “Coming!”

 

* * *

 

“This is dangerous, Winry!”

  
  
“I know.”

 

“Then why’d you come!”

  
  
“Because I have to protect you.”

  
  
“I don’t need protecting!”

 

“Call it peace of mind, then,” you say, and glare until Ed shuts up. “You keep getting in dangerous situations, and if I’m here I can fix up your automail easier. Plus, I get paid by the military and my customers. Granny can live comfortably.”

 

“But-”

 

“No, Ed. Just focus on getting your bodies back, okay?” You smile, brightly, because now you can support them, and Granny. The military is dangerous, you know this. If you help people they’ve asked you not to help, you could be shot for treason. You know this too.

 

But it’s the best way to help people, for now.

 

(Mustang’s totally planning to take over anyway, so it’ll all be okay, in the end.)

 

* * *

 

When it is revealed that the Freezing Alchemist has an automail arm, they ask you if you can deactivate it. You say you can. They ask you to do so when they have him in custody.

 

(They kill him, but they give you the arm to study anyway. It’s not as good as the ones you make, but it’s still a great model - marred by the alchemy circle carved into the shoulder. It’s got two parts - you can activate half of it to freeze water, and the other half to boil it. You shudder to think what it would do to a human, and you destroy it. When they ask, you say you had to cut open the shoulder to get a better look at the inner workings. They don’t question you.)

 

* * *

 

Ed and Al come back from Liore the same way they come back from every mission - banged up, tired, and irritated.

 

“No luck?” you ask. Ed just storms past you into the Colonel’s office, but Al comes to stand next to you.

 

“He had one,” Al says, “but it was destroyed, so it wasn’t a proper one.”

 

“You can’t destroy a philosopher’s stone,” you murmur, look up at Al, rest a hand on his shoulder, and smile softly. He tilts his head back, and you know that if he had a body he’d be smiling too.

 

“Ed hasn’t grown up much,” you comment, attempting to lighten the mood, “he’s still the same tiny short alchemist he was four years ago.” Al laughs, his voice light (and you still want to know how he can speak when he doesn’t have a tangible body, and therefore doesn’t have vocal chords or lungs or  _ anything that would allow him to speak _ ).

 

“I think his refusal to drink milk might be stunting his growth!”

 

(There is something else that could be stunting his growth, but you really don’t want to think about that.  _ Ed would have been short anyway, _ you think,  _ we didn’t do this to him _ . But you did, really, he may have grown taller, but he won’t ever get that chance with the weight of his automail holding him down. He’ll always be short now, you know this, but it still feels  _ wrong _ to have had a hand in it.)

 

* * *

 

You’ve been staying in the barracks for the past few years, but this time, as you move to leave the office (there are a surprisingly few amount of people who need automail surgery in the army - people need tuning, sometimes, but it is rare anyone asks you to build an entirely new limb) Riza catches your arm.

 

“You’re staying in the barracks, right?” she says, and you nod, mutely. “Come home with me - I’ve got a spare room, and I’d feel better knowing you’re safe.”   
  


“The barracks aren’t safe?” you ask. Her face darkens, and you remember Ed and his hunt for the philosopher’s stone, keeping him far, far from central on Mustang’s orders.

 

“Okay,” you say, “Just let me get my stuff.”

 

* * *

 

Riza’s house is nice; warm and cozy. The spare room is nice too - flowers on the cabinet, a royal blue blanket draped over the bedcovers.

 

“Thank you,” you tell her, and she smiles. It seems to lighten the whole room.

 

“You’re most welcome, Winry,” she replies.  _ Her teeth are so white, _ you note, absent, and nod. She tilts her head, almost questioning, and you smile back, softly. That seems to settle her, because she flashes another smile and leaves the room. “I’ll get dinner, okay?”

 

“Okay,” you say, and are left in a room that feels warm and homely despite having never been there before; despite the fact that it is not your home. 

 

( _ It could be your home _ , a voice whispers in your head, and you ignore it. That isn’t your choice to make.  _ It could be _ , the voice responds, viciously persistent. You shake your head and go get dinner.)

 

* * *

 

People die. That is a facet of life. Your parent’s died, and now Hughes is dead too.

 

You’ll be fine.

 

You always are. It’s not like you even knew him that well anyway.

 

( _ You could have saved him _ , a voice in your head whispers, and it’s different from the normal voice. That voice was kind, and warm, almost, and this one is cold and vicious. This one, you can’t ignore.  _ If you can’t save Hughes, how are you supposed to save Ed? _ )

 

* * *

 

When corruption in the military is revealed, you really aren’t that surprised. When Ed and Al and Mustang get dragged into it (and because Mustang is a part of it, so is Riza) you’re not surprised.

 

When you follow them deep into the heart of corruption, stand by them with one of Riza’s guns on your hip and with the determination to help them any way you can, they are surprised.

 

You’re not.

 

This is what you came here for, after all.

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on tumblr [@faeflowerfeline](https://faeflowerfeline.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
